


The Single Worst And Cringiest AU Ever Written

by putconspiraciesinit



Category: 19th Century CE RPF, Historical RPF, Political RPF - US 19th c.
Genre: Alternate Universe - Celebrity, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Music, Gen, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, Lawsuits, M/M, References to Drugs, Sexual Harassment, Sleep Deprivation, Social Media, Stalking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-22
Updated: 2019-05-20
Packaged: 2019-11-03 16:00:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 15
Words: 7,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17880836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/putconspiraciesinit/pseuds/putconspiraciesinit
Summary: "Little Burr and the Little Band" is an actual boy band, as is "the Gay Trio." Set from 2019 to 2028. A lot of lawsuits happen. Very little changes about James Cheetham.





	1. Prologue 1: Throwing Shade

**Author's Note:**

> Nothing graphic actually happens on screen. The warnings are there as a precaution, as physical and sexual violence are explicitly referenced and stated to happen, but none of it actually occurs on screen or is described.

“He’s not talented, he’s not smart, he’s not _anything_ , he’s just...a well-decorated empty shell, honestly. A hollow husk of a person, but with a pretty face and a nice ass. I mean, look at him! His personality is a fucking golden retriever, always the same super excited and happy shit, like, he is so fucking fake. _Nobody_ is that happy. He’s a manufactured pop star who’ll be completely irrelevant in a couple of years if he doesn’t keep fucking big-name managers for deals.”

The interviewer’s eyes widened; clearly, she had not expected to hear such strong words.

“Did something happen between you two, during that concert? What’s the story, here? Why do you hate him, now?”

Hamilton rolled his eyes. “I don’t hate Aaron Burr, okay? Hate is a personal feeling. I don’t really know him as a person, assuming he _is_ a person. What I hate is his persona, and how his whole career is based on how sexy he is. Like...I prefer to focus on actually making music, y’know?”

“Well! That...we’ve got some beef going on, apparently! Alexander Hamilton, ladies and gentlemen!”

The audience applauded. A few people said _damn_.

 

***

 

“So,” said the interviewer, in the way that interviewers say things when gearing up to introduce a controversial topic, “Alexander Hamilton recently made some comments about you, did you see that?”

Burr laughed. “I don’t...I don’t want beef with him. Really. I don’t want beef with anyone, I just want to perform. I think what he said was unwarranted, but I’m not gonna throw any shade. I’ve always liked the Gay Trio as musicians. They don’t have to like me and my band, but...yeah. I feel like he wants one of those big dramatic celebrity feuds, and I really don’t want to be in any of those, if I can avoid them.”

“He said you were more focused on being sexy than on your music, how do you feel about that?”

“Look, I’m not gonna pretend not to want attention. I consider myself a _performance_ artist. To me, the performance itself is, y’know...as important as the actual music. I don’t expect other musicians to agree with me, but for me and the guys, that’s what it is. That’s out gimmick, you could say. Different artists just like to execute their art differently, it’s not always a matter of being better or worse.”

“Well-said!” Laughed the interviewer. “You really don’t have any similar jabs to make at Alex, do you?”

“I’m here to have a good time, which I find difficult to do while beefing with someone.”

The audience applauded halfheartedly. Someone sitting close to the set whined,

“Why do people still interview that guy? This shit’s mad boring.”

 


	2. Prologue 2: Pendleton and Van Ness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> look i warned y'all this was going to be cringey and awful

@WPVN: @OfficialAlexHamilton can back the fuck off honestly, Burr might be above this shit but I sure as hell ain’t, come at me 🅱️itch

 

@WPVN: @Pendle10 What do you want, a spreadsheet of all the men and women I’ve slept with so you can verify that it’s close enough to 50/50 for me to count as Actually Bi?? Fuck off my dude it’s 2019

 

@WPVN: Meet me in the pit or some shit @Pendle10 I am dead serious

 

Screencaps of the incendiary tweets were all over social media mere hours before the video footage of the context.

The footage was obviously taken on someone’s phone, but it wasn’t bigfoot footage levels of bad quality; one could clearly make out what was happening. One of the vocalists from the Little Band and a supporting guitarist for the Gay Trio--William P. Van Ness and Nathaniel Pendleton, respectively--in a physical altercation. Pendleton’s Instagram story showed he had a rather nasty bruise on his cheek. Each claimed the other had started it.

 

***

 

“They’re fucking narcissists,” said Van Ness. “We didn’t do jack shit to them. Burr’s the nicest person I know. Hamilton just came at him out of nowhere, trying to start a fight, and of course Pendleton immediately joins in, because he needs to suck up to the actual members of the Gay Trio so he can get media coverage like they do.”

The interviewer was nothing short of gleeful at how genuinely irritated the singer sounded.

“So what exactly happened? How did things get to blows, between you and Pendleton?”

“He said me and Burr and the others are like...pretending to be gay or bi for attention. I normally wouldn’t throw hands over that shit, but I was really drunk, and he kept going at it, y’know? Like, when I didn’t respond the first fifty times, he kept saying it. He followed me around the party trying to talk shit about Burr and the band.”

“So, you punched him?”

“I told him I’d punch him if he didn’t shut his face or go bother someone else. He said, ‘no you won’t.’ And _then_ I punched him.”

“So is the Little Band officially feuding with the Gay Trio now?”

“I mean, I don’t think so. John and Gilbert haven’t said anything, Burr says he doesn’t want any feuds, really, it’s just me and Pendleton feuding at this point. If Pendleton even counts as enough of a celebrity to have ‘feuds’ instead of petty rivalries.”

The audience went absolutely wild.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> twitter handles:  
> @WPVN is William P. Van Ness  
> @OfficialAlexHamilton is Alexander Hamilton  
> @Pendle10 is Nathaniel Pendleton


	3. Prologue 3: Burr Sucks at Mediating

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is vague and badly written and i wrote it in like 5 minutes

Burr took to Twitter almost a week after the Pendleton-Van Ness incident, posting one of those rants in the form of iPhone notes app screenshots.

“I don't know why people want a response from me so badly. William isn’t a child, he’s not my responsibility. He doesn’t speak for me, I still really don’t want this feud, and I’m not going to participate in it, but...honestly, I think William has every right to be angry. Alex and Pendleton have both, completely unprovoked and out of nowhere, tried to start fights now. I can’t expect the rest of my band to just take it and not get mad.”

The angry tweets poured in instantaneously.

 

@DeWitty: @LittleBurr you can’t say you ‘won’t get involved’ in a fight and then openly take sides in it?? if you don’t want to participate then don’t participate

 

@Dyingston:  
Aaron Burr: I refuse to get involved in this fight.

Aaron Burr 2 seconds later: Anyway Van Ness did nothing wrong ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ totally not getting involved though

 

@AmericanCitizen: All @OfficialAlexHamilton and @LittleBurr do is act like they’re ~Above It All~ while still being petty mfs and tbh can we just cancel them both already

 

Pendleton defended his comments:

“Look, the Little Band, their whole _thing_ is sexual shock value. My intention wasn’t to insinuate anything about bi or gay people, it was to insinuate something about the guys in the Little Band.”

Hamilton, it seemed, also had quite a bit to say.

“Watch Burr and his boys throw a whole fucking hissy fit because someone _dared_ to call them out on their narcissistic bullshit, like they’re the victims somehow. Van Ness literally started a fist fight and Burr openly condoned it but yeah, Pendleton and I are totally the bad guys here.”

 

***

 

“So,” said the interviewer, “what do you have to say about Alex’s recent accusations?”

Burr sighed. “I...they aren’t true. I’ve never met a woman named Tania Raymond in my life--I do tend to remember who I sleep with.”

“How do you plan on telling that to the Internet?

“Look, I don’t know what to do, I just hope nobody believes him. I hope they find it suspicious that he’s accusing me on her behalf, and that no record of her exists on any social media, and that he refuses to give _any_ details of the story. If anyone wants to investigate me, I’ll let them. I’m fairly confident they won’t find anything.”

“Do you have anything to say to Alex?”

“Well, I would like him to leave me alone. I’ve said it a hundred times now, I won’t fight him.”

 

The next show the Little Band performed sold half the amount of tickets they usually did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> twitter handles:  
> @DeWitty is DeWitt Clinton  
> @LittleBurr is Aaron Burr  
> @Dyingston is Robert Livingston  
> @AmericanCitizen is James Cheetham


	4. Prologue 4: Hamilton is Rude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> i'll stop going all lemony snicket on you guys after chapter 6 because anyone who reads that far through this has my respect for subjecting themselves to this

The audio footage was all over social media within minutes of its recording.

 

***

 

“He’s a fucking slut,” Hamilton had said. “I don’t know how else to put it. The whole group, they’re sluts. And I don’t mean in an empowered and confident way, like Nicki Minaj or some shit, I mean they’re pathetic and use sex and sex appeal to seem less pathetic because it’s the only thing they’re good at.”

“How would you know how good at sex any of them are?” Laughed...somebody, nobody knew who.

“Well, for Burr, we’ve got the testimony of like, half the world’s population. I don’t know, for the rest of them. Burr also  _ looks _ like he’s good at sex, y’know?”

 

***

Burr paused the recording, not wanting to have to hear what Hamilton had said after that last line. He could have happily gone through his whole life without having to have heard it the first time, but there it was.

 

***

 

“He moans in his songs all the time, so we know he’s good at that.”

“Damn, Alex. You’re really just sounding like you want to fuck Burr, honestly.”

Hamilton cackled. “I don’t know, maybe I  _ do _ want to fuck him. I hate him, I really do--I know I said I didn’t hate him, before, but now I definitely hate him--but nobody can deny that he’s hot. I find his voice annoying, but I can think of a good way I could shut him up.”

 

***

 

_ Maybe _ , thought Burr _ , I could charge him with harassment at this point _ ? Hamilton’s rampaging had damaged the Little Band’s sales and publicity, for the past year, now. Was that grounds for a lawsuit? More importantly, did Burr really want to be that guy who sued people?


	5. Prologue 5: Hamilton Gets Sued

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> all of these chapters are mad short and may or may not get longer as this thing progresses but wouldn't you rather read 20 really short chapters of this dumbassery than 20 actual length chapters?

When the news got out that ‘Tania Raymond’ did not actually exist, Burr and the Little Band should have recovered. Unfortunately, they did not; their feud with Hamilton and the Gay Trio was as active as it had been since mid-2019. Two years later, now. 

After Hamilton had made several very explicit comments, Burr decided he’d had enough; and so, the first lawsuit was born.

 

***

 

“I don’t feel it necessary to debate whether or not the defendant actually sexually harassed my client. We have audio and video footage!”

“What we are debating, Mr. Martin, is whether or not my client saying rude things about Mr. Burr is actually worth demanding monetary compensation over! What  _ damage _ has been done?”

“My client’s sales have been plummeting since this ‘feud’ between him and Mr. Hamilton started! They are losing a considerable amount of money!”

“And how do you intend to prove that this is a direct result of some petty feud? All artists lose relevance, eventually, and the Little Band have been around for seven years.”

 

***

 

They lost.

“It’s alright, Burr,” said Martin. “Sexual harassment lawsuits are very difficult to win.”

“I just want Hamilton to stop, you know? I want to get back to how things were before he got involved.”

“If it makes you feel any better, maybe just getting sued at all will discourage him from making weird comments.”

“I hope.”


	6. Hamilton Being Hamilton

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TW for sexual assault (groping)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> last chapter where i will lemony snicket you guys  
> it just gets worse from this chapter on

The feud between the Gay Trio and the Little Band had been going on for five years now, on and off. One month, one would open for the other. The next, Hamilton would be accusing Burr of all sorts of things in interviews. Sometimes, it seemed like the feud made the groups more relevant. Other times, Hamilton’s accusations would catch on, even after being proven false, and the Little Band’s sales would plummet. Five years was long enough for Burr to grow accustomed to it. Accustomed enough that he could behave as though it wasn’t happening. Which is why he thought it wouldn’t be too bad an idea to attend a party he knew would also be attended by Hamilton.

Bright flashing lights in all different colors, music blaring at top volume, the smells of booze and various perfumes saturating the air, and as many people as possible packed into the room, dancing, grinding, singing loudly and off-key, and Burr was in his element. Some people found such settings abhorrent, but Burr thrived in them. He navigated through the crowd with impressive ease, made his way to the bar.

“Can I get ten polar bear shots, please? One of my friends bet me a hundred bucks that I can’t do ten in a minute and a half.”

About a meter away, Van Ness shouted, “You can’t!”

Burr laughed. “You’re going to owe me a hundred bucks, dude. You time me.”

The guy sitting beside Van Ness--John Swartwout, another member of the Little Band--whipped out his phone.

“I’m going to post this all over the place, and there is nothing either of you can do about it.”

“That’s valid,” said Burr, and downed the first shot almost alarmingly fast. By the time he got to the final tenth shot, he looked slightly pained. “Ugh, speed-drinking can really give you a headache...how much time?”

“One minute and  _ thirty-one seconds _ , Burr!” Cackled Van Ness. “You owe me, dumbass!”

“Ah, fuck. Here,” Burr, as one who is rich and famous does, pulled a hundred-dollar bill out of his pocket, and handed it to Van Ness. “One second...I lost by  _ one second _ …”

Swartwout smiled, rolling his eyes. “Ten shots in a minute and a half is wild, man. I can’t do half that, in that amount of time.”

“Last call, everyone! Club closes in half an hour!” Someone yelled over the mic.

“Well,” said Burr, “I’m gonna leave, I want to get back to the hotel before I start feeling sick.”

“Alright, we’ll meet you back there in a bit!” Said Swartwout, before ordering what was probably his fiftieth round of jello shots that night. “Van Ness said he’d stay here with me to make sure I don’t do anything stupid.”

***

 

It was a nice temperature outside. Warm enough to comfortably wear shorts, but not  _ hot _ . Burr was in a great mood. Then, he heard footsteps behind him.

“Burr.”

It was Hamilton’s voice. Burr whirled around, but, thoroughly drunk, lost his balance and fell over. He braced himself for the fall--but instead, found himself pushed back upright, against the wall of a building. Dazed, he looked up. Hamilton stood over him, arms on either side of him, looking down at him with an expression of very,  _ very _ drunk smugness.

“Hamil...ton?”

“Shh. Don’t speak, don’t make any noise.”

Burr groaned, wondering vaguely what Hamilton was trying to accomplish here--until he felt a hand grabbing hold of his shirt, yanking it up over his head. His eyes widened as Hamilton began to feel his now-bare chest with one hand, and shoved the other down Burr’s pants, fondling and squeezing his ass.

“God, I want you, Burr…”

“No. No! Stop it!”

Hamilton did not stop it.

“I said,” Burr gathered all his strength and kneed Hamilton in the crotch, “ _ stop _ it! Get  _ off _ me!”

Hamilton stumbled backwards, in evident pain, and Burr ran. He was lucid enough to remember how to get back to the hotel where he was staying, but not lucid enough to be fully conscious of anything besides running for it.


	7. Hamilton Gets Sued 2.0

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> [enter Maria Reynolds]

The last time Hamilton had been in a courtroom, it had been under not entirely dissimilar circumstances. However, the charges were slightly more severe this time, and this time, his accuser was not alone.

“I told him what was happening with my husband,” the woman said. A young woman, maybe in her early twenties, and very upset-looking. “I wanted  _ help _ , I was...I had no way out, when he asked me to sleep with him, I couldn’t say no.”

The judge raised an eyebrow. “You felt like you had no choice?”

“I  _ didn't _ have a choice. If I didn’t get the money, my husband would kill our daughter. If I didn’t sleep with Mr. Hamilton, he wouldn’t give me the money. Mr. Hamilton knew that there were violent threats involved, and he took advantage.”

“Objection, your honor!” Yelled Hamilton.

“Yes, Mr. Hamilton?”

“Mrs. Reynolds never told me her daughter’s life was at risk.”

“Did she tell you of any other violent threats against herself or her daughter?”

Hamilton looked down, and sighed loudly. “...do I have to answer that, Your Honor?”

“You do.”

“She...told me that her husband was physically abusive towards her.”

“So you were aware of the severity of the situation?”  
“I didn’t know someone might get _murdered_!”

Mrs. Reynolds glared at Hamilton. “Your Honor, Mr. Hamilton has a track record of sexually mistreating people--and what’s more, I don’t think possible murder should have to be involved for a rich, famous, and influential person to know that they shouldn’t sexually extort people.”

 

***

 

Of all the people Hamilton had not expected (or wanted, for that matter) to appear as a witness against him, it was Aaron Burr. But there he was.

“So far, Mrs. Reynolds has told nothing but the truth. We have the phone calls and other witness testimony to prove that she was telling the truth about Mr. Reynolds’ violent tendencies. And Mr. Hamilton  _ does _ have a track record of sexually mistreating people; less than a week ago, he accosted me outside a club and--”

“I was  _ drunk _ , Burr!” Cried Hamilton. “I was  _ incredibly _ drunk, you must have noticed  _ that _ , my breath must have  _ reeked _ of alcohol!”

“Order!” Yelled the judge. “Mr. Hamilton, you do realize that--depending on further testimony from Mr. Burr--you may have just confessed to sexual harassment or assault?”

Hamilton blanched. “I...I didn’t mean…”

“He pinned me against a wall, your honor, he forcibly removed my shirt and groped me. He has also made very graphic comments about  _ wanting _ to sexually assault people--all of which we have on tape. Is it really such a reach to believe that a man who explicitly expresses desire to force others into oral sex, and gropes people and tears their clothes off, would commit the crime he is currently being tried for?”

 

***

 

An ensuing case found Mr. Reynolds guilty of spousal and child abuse, extortion, blackmail, and child sexual abuse--as it turned out, he had forced Maria to marry him at the age of fifteen, and fabricated documentation claiming she was eighteen. He received a sentence of fifteen years in prison, and would be eligible for parole after seven. Some thought the sentencing was too light, others thought that Maria was a lying gold digging whore who made the whole thing up for attention; overall, a typical public response to an abuse case.

Between the recorded phone calls showing that James Reynolds had indeed made all the threats and committed all the acts of violence his wife had accused him of, the audio recordings showing that Hamilton had indeed make the comments Burr had accused him of, and the video footage on social media of what was now being referred to as the Hamilton-Burr incident, and several stupid comments made by Hamilton in the heat of the moment that accidentally incriminated him, the judge ultimately found Hamilton guilty of sexual assault and rape, and sentenced him to five years in prison.


	8. Cheetham Gets Sued

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are...a lot of lawsuits in this fic.  
> Cheetham's colleague Denniston (mentioned in passing at the end) was a real person but I know literally nothing about him besides that he was also an American Citizen dude and his first initial was D.  
> Gotta be historically accurate in this fic where 18th/19th century lawyer and campaigner Aaron Burr is a singer and the frontman for a popular boy band in the 2020s.

Hamilton was in prison, Maria was safe, Martin’s law practice was thriving, as were the Little Band’s sales, and Pendleton and Van Ness had agreed to drop it and stop feuding. Things should have been going very well for Aaron Burr. Unfortunately, however, he was currently in court. Again.

Many celebrities--mostly the female ones under the age of thirty-five, but not exclusively--would not be paranoid to fear that someone might leak nudes or sex tapes of them. It was a fairly common celebrity scandal, and it could make or completely break a career. As Burr became more and more of a sex symbol, in retrospect, he realized that he should have seen this coming, but alas, he rarely saw things coming.

Videos dating from 2010 to 2013 had surfaced mysteriously on PornHub, of Burr. Sleeping with various men and women. Sometimes tied up, sometimes gagged, sometimes begging for it; it was porn, plain and simple. Burr had never been shy about his sex life, nor had he ever kept it private. He wouldn’t be ashamed of the videos...if it weren’t for the dates. He had only been sixteen in 2010. Another lawsuit was clearly needed.

 

***

 

PornHub as an entity were reasonably found to not have known that Burr as he appeared in the leaked videos had been a minor, and proved that they had taken the videos down immediately upon finding out. However, the case hadn’t been completely useless; they were able to tell the police who exactly had uploaded the videos in the first place.

 

***

 

“Your honor,” said Cheetham, “I never got or tried to get any sexual gratification from the videos in question. I was just trying to stir up gossip, which is my job!”

James Cheetham, the editor of a site that could only be described as a cross between those tabloid magazines grocery stores sell at checkout counters and BuzzFeed, had been arrested almost immediately after being discovered to be the mysterious sex tape leaker.

“Your honor!” Yelled Martin, horrified. “If anything, the comment Mr. Cheetham just made only makes this even more morally reprehensible!  _ Yes, I had sexually explicit content of a minor uploaded to PornHub without telling them one of the stars was a minor, but it wasn’t because I’m a pedophile, it was just so the public would ridicule the minor in question for having been sexually exploited! _ I believe the defendant’s behavior speaks for itself, here.”

“Being convicted of kiddie porn charges means you have to be on the sex offender registry, but I never actually  _ did _ anything sex offend-y!”

“Very eloquent, Mr. Cheetham,” scoffed Martin.

“Order, please,” said the judge.

 

***

 

The charges against Cheetham escalated to both distribution of child pornography and general defamation of character, for which he had been sued many, many times before, when the rest of the Little Band got involved.

“He spread rumors claiming that Burr sexually extorted us, it took over a year to convince people it wasn’t true and  _ tanked _ our sales for  _ months _ ,” said Robert.

“He posted pictures of me with bruises photoshopped onto my face and said it was because me and Davis got in fights on a regular basis and secretly wanted to break up the band,” said Bartow. “People really believed it. You should have seen the backlash against Davis.”

“Remember that time Hamilton accused Burr of raping a woman who turned out to not even be a real person? He probably stole that tactic from Cheetham, because Cheetham did that all the time,” said Davis.

“Cheetham once accused me of trying to kill someone,” claimed Van ness. “I actually almost got investigated by the police over that, though to be fair, it took them like, two hours to figure out that Cheetham was full of it.”

 

***

 

“I’m not proud of those videos, your honor,” sighed Burr. “You have to understand, I did those as a last resort. I was completely broke and I needed to make money somehow, and I couldn’t get a...more age-appropriate job. I was a teenager with no experience whatsoever and even the entry-level minimum wage jobs required a bachelor’s degree, several years of experience, or both, to apply.”

“Do you know who any of the other people in the videos are, Mr. Burr?”

“I have no idea, your honor. I didn’t know any of them personally. We met when it was time to film, and we never learned each other’s real names.”

“What gave you the idea to turn to sex work?”

“I...I learned how much money you could make from it. I wasn’t forced or pressured, if that’s what you mean. I saw that I could make a month’s rent for one video and I was sold. Like I said, I’m not proud of it, but besides Mr. Cheetham’s distribution of the videos, I don’t think there are any criminal charges that can be pressed here, as one would have to go to all the trouble of finding out who all the adults in the videos are--and the most recent of the videos is from eleven years ago. The most recent one where I was under eighteen was thirteen years ago.”

“Listen,” groaned Cheetham, “I am  _ not _ a creep.”

“Your website, Mr. Cheetham, which has been the source of  _ seven _ lawsuits against you, would suggest otherwise,” said the judge. “And the fact still stands that you posted those videos to PornHub knowing that one of the actors was under the age of majority. Whether you were ever sexually aroused by their contents is irrelevant.”

Two court sessions later, Cheetham was found guilty of possession and distribution of child pornography. He was registered as a sex offender and sentenced to ten years in prison. His website went to a colleague, Mr. Denniston.


	9. Shit Starts to Get Real

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> tw for mentions of drug use and someone almost dying

To watch the Little Band perform in 2025, so perfectly in sync, as energetic as ever, you could almost be forgiven for forgetting that various scandals involving them over the past six years had now landed two people in prison. The boys had all agreed that, during this tour, there would be no scandals, no cheap shock value. Just great shows.

The light show was beautiful, the music was loud, the crowd was equally so, the choreography was impressive, and by the end, the whole audience was calling for an encore.

“We’re covering _If I Could Turn Back Time_ by Cher, right?” Inquired Sam. “Burr? Uh, yo, Burr?”

Sam waved his hand in front of Burr’s face. “Dude.”

“Oh--!” Burr shuddered. “Uh…”

“Cher.”

“Yeah, that was the plan, I think!”

“Are you alright, Burr?”

Burr smiled. “Of course! I’m _always_ alright. Let’s do this!”

The opening guitar riff started and the crowd screamed. Each singer would sing one line of the verses, before Burr would take over the main melody for the chorus, with the others doing harmonies.

Van Ness noticed about two seconds before it happened. Burr looked paler than usual. His movements were just a little bit off--Burr was _never_ off. Something must be going on.

“If I could reach the…uh…” All at once, Burr was on the floor. His microphone hit the ground with an ear-splitting feedback noise.

“Stop the music!” Cried John. “Something’s wrong!” He knelt down and shook Burr rather vigorously. Burr remained immobile. John grabbed Burr's wrist. "His pulse is weak, someone call an ambulance!"

Davis took his phone out of his pocket and frantically dialed 9-1-1. “Yes, er, this is Matthew Davis from the Little Band--no, I’m not joking--Burr’s just collapsed in the middle of a song and he won’t wake up…”

 

***

 

“Apparent methamphetamine use aside, Aaron Burr has quite possibly the single worst case of chronic long-term sleep deprivation we have ever encountered. Really, it’s amazing he was able to make it to the encore before something like this happened.”

Burr had been in critical condition for two days that seemed to last two years, when he’d been taken in. Some had called it a miracle when his condition had started to improve, and beyond that when he had actually woken up.

“So,” said the doctor, “how often do you sleep?”

“Er…” Burr’s voice was weak. “I avoid it to the best of my abilities. I’m…” he yawned, “Busy, y’know?”

“Well, around how much do you sleep every night? Two hours? Three hours?”

“ _Every night_?”

The doctor’s expression could only be described as half-shocked and half-terrified.

“Well, yes, Mr. Burr! Are you telling me you don’t sleep every night?”

“I can usually make it five or six before falling asleep,” laughed Burr. “Without coffee or stimulants, three or four.”

“...are you aware that the average adult should be getting six to eight hours every night?”

“Does anyone _actually_ sleep that much, though?”

“They tend to _try_! Mr. Burr, how long have you been saying awake for this long on a regular basis?”

“I don’t know, honestly? I haven’t really had time to sleep since university, and that was a while ago.”

“How old were you when you finished university?”

“Sixteen.”

“And you are thirty-one now, correct?”  
  
“Yeah…”

“So, for the past _fifteen years_ , you’ve been trying your best to sleep as little as possible?”

“I’m not sure how to put this lightly, Mr. Burr, but lack of sleep has damaged your brain. Have you experienced any trouble eating, lately?”

“...Yes, is that a thing?”

“Oh, boy.”


	10. Enter Thomas Jefferson

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Really short chapter but I didn't feel like lumping this one in with either 9 or 11 so it's a chapter lmao

Burr spent a month in the hospital. He was given rohypnol to fall asleep; it had been discovered that he weighed barely more than eighty pounds, as lack of sleep had deprived his body of the ability to feel any hunger. Immediately afterwards, he spent three months in rehab, with the purpose of not using meth anymore and safely ceasing use of rohypnol to sleep. The Little Band was officially on hiatus.

The hiatus ended the moment Burr made it out of rehab, with a show that very day to celebrate his apparent recovery; and he had recovered to a great extent, having gained over thirty pounds, and sleeping every other night.

“I could never go four days straight through without sleep anymore,” he’d told an interviewer. “Four used to be normal for me, I could do four no problem, I’d only get tired at the five mark and I’d only forcibly fall asleep after six. Nowadays, just three feels impossible. That’s probably a good thing, though it’s also a bit weird.”

 

***

 

It wasn’t until the day of the Little Band’s first post-hiatus show that their manager seemed to have anything to say. When he did, he said it through Twitter;

 

@ThosJefferson: What do you people want from me? Tuck Burr into bed every night? He did this to himself.

 

@ThosJefferson: I’ve known Burr for over a decade. He can be an idiot. That isn’t my fault.

 

The public outcry was instantaneous.

 

@6ft3weighsafuckington: I’ve known Burr for twenty-seven years, and no, he’s not an idiot. Overworking is a rampant issue in every arts and entertainment industry.

 

@livingpokerfacememe: When your employee almost works himself to death and your response is “he’s an idiot and I shouldn’t have to give my opinions on this situation,” you’re. probably not a good person.

 

However, no tweet was more inflammatory than those from one of the members of the Little Band.

 

@SwartwoutNo1: Mr. Jefferson knew Burr was drinking as many as 20 cups of coffee some days, he knew Burr was using meth, he knew Burr was starving, he knew Burr wasn’t sleeping, and instead of intervening, he encouraged it. (1/2)

@SwartwoutNo1: (2/2) This is Mr. Jefferson’s fault, and I hope Burr sues his ass. Fuck him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Twitter handles:  
> @ThosJefferson is Thomas Jefferson  
> @6ft3weighsafuckington is Jonathan Dayton  
> @livingpokerfacememe is Aaron Ogden  
> @SwartwoutNo1 is John Swartwout


	11. Jefferson Controversy Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> tw for physical and financial abuse  
> This whole fic is literally a metaphor for the Burr-Hamilton duel, the election of 1800, and (later) the Burr conspiracy, but like, out of chronological order  
> Chapters 1-6 are buildup and chapter 7 is the duel but instead of killing Hamilton Burr helps get him sent to prison  
> Chapters 8-12 are the election (in that Burr almost dies of sleep deprivation and Jefferson is horrible)  
> soon as it's time for chapter 13 some crazy stuff is gonna happen woop

John deleted his tweets about Jefferson hours after posting them, but hours was enough time for there to be screenshots all over every social media platform out there. A couple of days later, he was at it again; this time, on his snapchat story.

_ Guess who made me take those tweets down :\ anyway, what I meant was--I’m not gonna use his name this time but you know who I mean, right--he saw what Burr was doing to himself for work purposes and instead of trying to help, he just changed Burr’s schedule so he wouldn’t be able to stop. (1/?) _

_ The rest of us never got like that because he’s obsessed with Burr, like...seriously, it’s really creepy and that’s part of why Burr hasn’t said anything about it yet, that dude can be Scary sometimes, but he won’t do anything to me or the others who aren’t Burr, so yeah, here I am yelling about this shit on snap lmao oof (2/2) _

_ Side note, to the guy I’m talking about, you know who you are, if you see this and throw a hissy fit and insist I take it down/call it libel/whatever, you’ll be admitting that you did all this shit. I never said your name so ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ _

 

***

 

At that point, nobody knew what had happened, but it was Burr himself who added fuel to the fire on Twitter next.

 

@LittleBurr: The rumors that the band are trying to get a different manager and leave Mr. J______ are true.

 

That was all he said.

 

***

 

“So, the American Citizen is owned by Monticello Records?”

“Yeah,” said Denniston.

“The record label owned by one Thomas Jefferson?” The interviewer looked utterly incredulous.

“Yeah, the site was founded by one of his friends, Clinton, but like, Clinton wasn’t gonna write the kinds of stuff you see on there, so he got Cheetham to run the place.”

“So you’re telling me that, during his tenure as the editor in chief of  _ the American Citizen _ , James Cheetham was working for Thomas Jefferson?”

“This is really feeling more like an interrogation than an interview, dude. James is already in prison, what’s the point?” He paused. “...But yeah, he was. Indirectly. Really, we worked for Clinton, but Clinton worked for Jefferson, so y’know.”

 

***

 

It all culminated with an audio recording posted to Twitter by Robert.

 

@OfficialRSwartwout: What happens when you leave your phone in the studio on record after almost everyone leaves (trigger warning) Seriously, Internet people do your thing so we can cancel Jefferson this shit is scary #WhatTheFuck

 

Some of the dialogue was distorted and not entirely audible--but what  _ was _ clearly audible was the sound of someone hitting something, followed immediately by a loud thud and a pained-sounding cry, and what was unmistakably Thomas Jefferson’s voice screaming furiously,  _ Tell John to get that shit off or I’m getting the  _ Citizen _ right back on your case _ .

 

The recording was immediately followed by almost equally disturbing tweets.

 

@WPVN: Oh, now that we’re telling people about Mr. Jefferson? He also personally pockets almost all of the money we make from everything we do that makes money. 

 

@LittleBurr: Yes, he did hit me in that audio recording. This is why I said we were trying to find new management. I didn’t want to talk about this openly at first, but maybe some backlash will help, in this case.

 

@LittleBurr: I really don’t want to go to court again, honestly, but if that’s what needs to happen, then. you guys know the drill

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> twitter handles:  
> @OfficialRSwartwout is Robert Swartwout  
> I am not creative making these up lmao
> 
> also. warning. next chapter is gonna be MAD short


	12. Disband

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the shortest chapter here it's like 3 lines but it didn't fit in the previous or next chapters so enjoy lmao sorry  
> this is less of a chapter honestly and more of like. some transitional lines

@LittleBurr: The Little Band are officially disbanding. Thank you to everyone who supported us, these were the best years of my life.

 

Less than an hour later, this tweet was followed up with another one which was deleted within minutes:

 

@LittleBurr: We didn’t want to disband. We just didn’t want to go to court even more.


	13. The Burr Conspiracy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> historically speaking, it's not impossible that blennerhassett aggressively playing showoffy paganini songs at 1.5x speed is something that actually happened  
> also comfort tyler's existence is acknowledged with regards to the burr conspiracy for the first time since the year 1807 in a weird crack fic where the early american political scene is represented by the modern music industry

Jonathan Dayton and Aaron Ogden, the two members of an experimental electronic music project since their teen years.

Comfort Tyler, a drummer who had become semi-famous on YouTube for his serious improv skills.

Harman Blennerhassett, a classical violinist known for somehow managing to play Paganini pieces considerably _faster_ than they were intended to be played.

And Aaron Burr, the controversial former frontman and lead singer of a now-defunct pop ensemble.

 

All five men announced their collaboration at the _exact_ same time, at 12:00 AM, November 6th 2025, only a couple of months since the Little Band had been forced to split up.

It wasn’t a collaboration anybody would have expected, mostly because the musicians involved were from vastly different genres, and the idea of a hardstyle-pop-classical mashup with very intense drums sounded utterly surreal--but it didn’t sound entirely _bad_ , and fans of all of the parties involved were eager to see what they came up with as this unlikely new musical group:

The Burr Conspiracy.

 

***

 

“So your hiatus from music is officially over, huh?”

“It is,” said Burr. "I can’t wait, honestly, everyone I’m working with here is so...talented, and generally really cool? I’ve known Aaron and Jonathan pretty much my whole life, and we’ve collaborated a few times before.”

“Is the Conspiracy going to be a second incarnation of the Little Band?”

“No, not really, we’re gonna have a really different...general _feel_ than the Little Band. I don’t think...it just wouldn’t, you know...feel _right_ doing a sort of Little Band 2.0 without any of the other original members, even if that’s the only way it could legally work. It would feel like a sort of betrayal.”

“Speaking of the Little Band and involved legal shenanigans,” chuckled the interviewer, “I take it you men found a new manager?”

Burr beamed, evidently excited. “Yes, we did--another old friend of mine, James Wilkinson, I have absolute confidence that there won’t be any... _controversies_ , with him.”

“There’s rumors going around on social media right now, about you and James Wilkinson--”

“They’re true! God, sorry I’m talking so fast, I’m just excited, he said I could tell the public if I wanted to. James and I are dating, we’ve been together since June!”

 

***

 

Given the interesting assortment of genres, nobody was entirely sure what sort of aesthetic to expect from the Burr Conspiracy. What they were likely _not_ expecting was for the outfits to be black and white, or for Burr to wear something that covered everything. The overall look was at some halfway point between steampunk and cyberpunk, the lyrics surreal and grandiose.

You might be forgiven for not realizing the band’s cool smug singer was the same Aaron Burr who had once danced around very provocatively in skimpy neon-colored costumes singing in thinly-veiled sexual metaphors and belting implausible high notes.


	14. The Wedding, take 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> God sorry for not updating in forever I had mad writer's block on this story but I do intend to finish it  
> Anyway, guess who's never written a wedding scene before lmao

It was New Year’s Eve, 2025, and to those in attendance it seemed like nowhere on the face of the planet was having more of a celebration than at the extravagant 5-star hotel Aaron Burr and James Wilkinson had chosen as their wedding venue. There was a massive choir, a full orchestra, an impressive light show, pyrotechnics, and  _ hundreds _ of people in attendance; Burr had insisted on opening the whole thing to the public, with a limit of two-thousand people (on a first-come-first-served basis, after the people who had been personally invited had gotten their spots). The cake, which was unreasonably gigantic, looked like the kind of cake one might see on a crazy instagram account, and besides the cake, there was probably enough food to feed a small country (and enough alcohol for about twice as many people).

Among the guests were, controversially, the former members of the Little Band, and what seemed like half the world’s journalist population. Less controversially, the other current members of the Burr Conspiracy were there, as well as Burr’s sister and her family. Tabloids would later report that Burr had made a point of not inviting his uncle and aunt, or any of his cousins, which he would neither confirm nor deny.

Wilkinson and his groomsmen wore golden-yellow suits with a vaguely military-inspired aesthetic; Burr and his groomsmen wore rose-gold suits, and in Burr’s case a very nice and long cape. Burr had designed the outfits himself (Wilkinson was not known to be a particularly fashionable man), very much hoping to draw as much attention as possible with them.

“I want all the tabloids yelling about this for months,” he told one reporter. “Like they do with royal weddings, you know?”

 

***

 

After the vows had been exchanged and the marriage officially officiated, the newlyweds wasted no time letting the reporters in attendance hound them for interviews.

 

***

 

“You’ve been married before, is that right?”

“Yes,” said Burr, “years ago, it was much lower-profile.”

“So, what happened there?”

“She, uh...passed away. I never really considered getting married again until James asked me, but...I think she would want me to move on. And I have, I really love James, I’m happy with him, I think this is going to work out really well.”

“So the two of you don’t have any plans on going the way of most celebrity couples?”  
“Ha! Well, no, no _plans_ , that’s for sure! That would be going a bit far for attention, even for me.”

 

***

 

The festivities lasted for a whole week, just about around the clock; feasts, fireworks, concerts, dancing, drinking, just about anything a person could want to encounter at a party. Finally, at midnight on January 7, the newlyweds announced the end of the party--along with the release date of the Burr Conspiracy’s highly-anticipated debut single.


	15. The Music Video / The Met Gala

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thomas Jefferson would absolutely wear a badly-tailored plain black suit to the Met Gala. He just would. This may not be truly historically accurate, but it is *spiritually* historically accurate.

_ Minutes _ after the first single dropped, the internet might as well have exploded over it. The lyrics were inflammatory enough; though nobody was named, the song took several not-so-subtle jabs at some of the people Burr had had controversies with, referencing the incidents of the past few years just explicitly enough that everyone knew exactly what Burr was talking about. But what really got people was the music video. It was one of those narrative music videos, very high-budget and with very impressive costumes, with a very post-apocalyptic fantasy-ish setting, and the main villain just so happened to be a very tall middle-aged ginger. Perhaps most controversial was a scene in which a man with more than a slight passing resemblance to Alexander Hamilton taunted and groped Burr--upon which Burr promptly  _ shot  _ him.

Really, it was a far cry from the Little Band’s dance pop songs about partying and having sex (and appropriate music videos). It was really more of an absolute five-minute character assassination.

The song broke some unreasonably high number of records within the first twenty-four hours. You couldn’t open any social media without seeing  _ something _ about the Burr Conspiracy. It seemed like the whole world was buzzing about them.

 

@ThosJefferson: @LittleBurr I see what you are doing here, and it’s disgusting. You need to get over yourself. We settled this a long time ago.

@LittleBurr: @ThosJefferson We never said your name in the song, my dear Mr. Jefferson.

@ThosJefferson: @LittleBurr You never had to.

@ThosJefferson: Mark my words, this does not end here.

@ThosJefferson: @LittleBurr You wait and see. I’ll end your whole career.

 

***

 

The actual theme that year was speculative fiction, and Burr’s outfit was a cross between the old-timey style you might expect from a standard fantasy setting and a nice LED light display that gave it some sci-fi aesthetic as well, as though the costuming department from some period drama had collaborated with the graphic designers from James Cameron’s  _ Avatar _ . It was very colorful and very showy, and Burr had designed it partially in the hopes that someone he didn’t like would be in attendance and be thoroughly spited by it. Of course, of all people,  _ Thomas Jefferson _ wound up in attendance, in a badly-tailored plain black suit.

The general consensus is that it really started to go down when Burr was overheard mocking Jefferson’s outfit.

“I mean, who in their right mind shows up to the  _ Met Gala _ in a fucking...it’s not even a flattering or  _ nice _ black suit, oh my god, he looks like a fucking ninth grader at a year’s-end semiformal, oh my god. Holy shit, you guys.”

“Bold of you to assume Jefferson is in his right mind, nowadays,” said Tyler.

“Bold of  _ you _ to assume he was  _ ever _ in his right mind!” cackled Blennerhassett.

“I looked better than that during my fucking awkward anime phase,” said Dayton.

“...That is very,  _ very _ debatable, Jonathan,” retorted Ogden.

“Oh, Aaron!” cried Burr. “Are you insinuating that our Jonathan is physically capable of looking as ugly as that horse-faced slob? Don’t roast him like this! None of us could be  _ that  _ bad if we tried.”

Burr had barely finished the sentence when he felt someone grab his neck, and a considerably large and bony fist collided with his cheek.

“I’ll fucking kill you, you little  _ shit _ !”

Jefferson punched him again, hard enough to make him lose his balance, then shoved him--he tripped, braced himself for the fall down the stairs, but Ogden managed to catch him before that could happen. And suddenly,  _ Jefferson _ was sent down the stairs. A few people shrieked. The reporters and tabloid people and photographers were going  _ wild _ . 

“He fucking attacked Burr, you guys had better have seen him hit first,” shouted Ogden, who, of course, had punched Jefferson.

One of the men Jefferson was with lunged at Burr, but was promptly kicked in the stomach by Dayton.

The fight was broken up quickly; they were, after all, at a very high-profile party of sorts. There were plenty of security people, and, of course, bystanders and whatnot. However, the drama had been started. Suddenly, what Jefferson had threatened back in January, over Twitter, was seeming a lot more plausible.


End file.
